This week Matt Gunterman of Ditch Mitch took issue with Markos and MyDD's Jonathan Singer promoting Crit Luallen over other potential KY Democrats considering a run against McConnell.  

Unfortunately, many of those big-name bloggers took the good news and managed to alienate needlessly a significant portion of the grassroots in Kentucky with it. Of particular note are Kos of DailyKos and Jonathan Singer of MyDD who ended their posts on the matter with nearly identical lines. To quote Singer, "If you want to help turn up the heat on McConnell, head over to DraftCrit.com -- which is seeking to get Democratic state Auditor Crit Luallen to run for the Senate -- to get involved."

Now, everybody here knows that Crit Luallen (D) isn't the only Democrat considering a run against Mitch McConnell. Attorney General Greg Stumbo (D) and Lt. Col. Andrew Horne (D) are actively doing so, as well. Everybody knows that; it's been talked about for months now.

And since everybody knows that, that's what makes the singular focus of Kos and Singer on the draft Luallen movement (which is by no means a bottom-up, grassroots effort; it's entirely driven by the Kentucky Democratic establishment) a blatant dissing of Stumbo, Horne, and their respective supporters.

This is the most recent example of tension between national and state bloggers, but it wasn't the first and won't be the last.  Back in August Chris Bowers wrote a post about his own experiences with that tension.  He'd received a lot of pushback from local bloggers over Blue Majority's pre-primary endorsement of Al Franken and the Bush Dogs campaign.  Chris took the position that you don't have to live in a state or congressional district to justify your interest and involvement in a race.  

As a state blogger I can understand where the pushback comes from.  State and local bloggers eat, sleep, and breathe local politics.  In covering the political process in our states we do gain a knowledge and insight into races that national bloggers just aren't likely to have.  Most local bloggers have probably had the experience of reading a well meaning post on a national blog where the author missed crucial points, or misunderstood what was going on at the ground level entirely.  It's frustrating, and figuring out how to respond isn't easy.  There's always the risk that rather than extinguishing a fire you'll cause it to spread.  

I'm interested in this tension because I'm certain we'll see more examples of it next year.  That isn't necessarily a bad thing.  Bloggers, no matter what aspect of the political process we cover, are passionate about our areas of expertise.  Once in awhile those passions are going to collide and disagreements will surface.  How we handle those differences within the netroots community is more important than any isolated disagreements we may have.    

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(crossposted at BlueGrassRoots)

Here's Mitch's reaction to Bush's dog and pony show last night:

"I think we've turned a corner in Iraq and we're headed to a new place."

That's right folks, for the 1,324,958th time, the Republican leadership has told us that we've finally turned the corner in Iraq, and success is here any day now. In fact, here's a map of the corner that Mitch McConnell is referring to.

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From the diaries, you know you've arrived when the Republican leader in the senate cites you in his campaign fundraising ask - Todd

(crossposted at BlueGrassRoots and DitchMitchKY)

Well, it looks like we've really gotten under someone's skin.

We've been hounding Mitch McConnell every day at Ditch Mitch, as his approval rating plummets, his base abandons him, and protesters trap him inside his apartment (he's too scared to face them).

Mitch McConnell is sending out fundraising letters to supporters in which he whines about the "liberals, radicals, far-left, unions, Hillary, Schumer, etc..." who are hounding him about his pathetic record and his obedience to corporate contributers and George W. Bush rather than his constituents in Kentucky.

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Fresh off of reports of DSCC polling showing Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell running just neck-and-neck with Democratic Rep. Ben Chandler in a potential 2008 matchup in Kentucky (McConnell 45, Chandler 44), McConnell has apparently turned to a GOP pollster to concoct numbers that show him comfortable in his reelection bid. But take a look at the questions required to push voters out of the camp of one of his possible Democratic challengers:

Mitch McConnell is only the 2nd person in Kentucky history to lead his party in the US Senate. On this, who do you agree with more (ROTATE)

• 70% People who feel that having someone from Kentucky lead his party in the Senate is a point of pride to them and will help get more done for the state
  
• 18% People who say having someone from Kentucky in a leadership position does not matter to them
  
• 5% Neither / other (DNR)
  
• 7% Don't know (DNR)

A point raised by critics is that Charlie Owen has no prior experience in public office and if elected he would be 70 years old on the day he was sworn in, one of the oldest freshman Senators in US history. In view of his age and lack of experience, do you have a very positive, somewhat positive, somewhat negative or very negative reaction to Charlie Owen running for Senate?

• 9% Very positive
  
• 22% Somewhat positive
  
• 32% Somewhat negative
  
• 21% Very negative
  
• 13% Don't know (DNR)

And based on their positions who are you most likely to vote for for US Senator? (ROTATE)
Charlie Owen who says he won't be politics as usual, that as minority leader Mitch McConnell is too caught up in Washington politics and isn't taking the time to get things done for the people of Kentucky
/OR/
Mitch McConnell who says that as Republican leader in the Senate he has proven to be effective in getting things done for Kentucky, that at age 70 Charlie Owen has no experience and will never build up the seniority to be effective for the state

• 29% Charlie Owen
  
• 55% Mitch McConnell
  
• Both of these equally (DNR) *
  
• 4% Neither of these / other (DNR)
  
• 10% Don't know (DNR)

As you can see the pollster, Jan R. van Lohuizen, uses a couple of tricks to achieve his desired results. First, the actual head-to-head question is phrased in such a way that there are positive and negative statements about both candidates, and so on the surface it would appear to be a balanced informed ballot question (or at least as balanced as these things come when commissioned by a particular candidate). Yet what does he do in the two questions preceding the informed ballot question? He loads the respondents with very unbalanced information -- positive information about McConnell and not one but two pieces of negative information about Owen. With this in mind, it's no wonder McConnell came out ahead in the final question.

But McConnell's performace in this rather unbalanced informed ballot question is less than one might have expected. For a sitting Senator to only receive 55 percent in a head-to-head match-up against someone portrayed as an old man with no political experience is actually somewhat underwhelming and is, in fact, somewhat telling about McConnell's weakness among Kentuckians. And as Mark Hebert, who posted the poll on his blog for WHAS News, notes, McConnell has been unable to crack the 50 percent approval mark in recent non-partisan polling from the state, yet more indication that the Senator is potentially vulnerable as he gears up for his reelection bid.

For more coverage of the effort to hold McConnell accountable and put him through the gauntlet this cycle, check out the Ditch Mitch blog.

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Seems like the only place to find the real debate about someone like McConnell is again on the blogs like myDD.com.  Some local blogs in Kentucky are hitting McConnell.  I've put some good ones at the end of this post.  Seems like McConnell is being praised in the regular press around here and by Republicans for his "political skills." McConnell also said recently that whatever happens now won't be remembered by KY voters in November '08.  

Three of our friends, however, died this month in Iraq.  McConnell is my Senator, and I know I won't forget how McConnell continues to prevent debate on the war with his pathetic procedural ploys.  I heard about a report recently that you can read at http://www.michaelmoore.com/words/latest news/index.php?id=9231 that showed that over 50% of the deaths in Iraq are occurring to people from small towns.  In Kentucky we have a lot of small towns. Our friends, family members are dying over there.  Will these families/people forget?  

Some good KY blogs (not a complete list) that are hitting McConnell include:  http://www.bluegrassreport.org by Mark Nicholas in Lexington; http://www.thebridge.typepad.com by DrTed in Louisville; http://www.hillbillyreport.com by Jim Pence of Central Kentucky/statewide; http://kydem.blogspot.com by Daniel Soltzman of Northern Kentucky

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